


bruised throats and tired eyes

by Fallenstar126



Category: Fall Out Boy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Punk, Bad Puns, Bar Room Brawl, Fights, M/M, Piercings, Serious Injuries, Starving Artist Pete Wentz, Super Punk Pete Wentz, Surprisingly Well Off Patrick Stump
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-06-29
Updated: 2015-06-29
Packaged: 2018-04-06 18:25:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,487
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4232130
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fallenstar126/pseuds/Fallenstar126
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Pete Wentz liked to fight people. Of course, given that he was a tiny asshole, most times he was on the losing end of said fights. He would pick himself up, dust off, lick his wounds, and get back to trying to create a living for himself. </p><p>Then, one day, Pete meets Patrick Stump. Or rather, Patrick Stump picks up his broken and bruised body from a bar floor, and takes him home, cleaning him up and tending any injuries he happens to have. </p><p>Of course, he finds anyway to fuck it up, because that's what Pete does best.</p>
            </blockquote>





	bruised throats and tired eyes

The first time they met, Pete was staring up at the dirty bar ceiling, stars swarming his vision, close to blacking out. He only managed to hang onto consciousness when a figured leaned into his view, crouching down beside him and waving a hand in front of his face.

 

“Can you hear me?” The figure’s voice came through the ringing in his ears, warbled and faint, but still there. After a second, Pete figured out how to communicate to the rest of his body to respond. Eventually, his head moved in an affirmative motion. “Good, can you move anything besides your head? Like, can you stand up? I mean, not trying to rush you or anything, but it probably would be best to get up off the floor and maybe out of this dirty bar before your injuries get infected.”

 

Pete groaned lightly in protest, but still pushed himself up into a sitting position.

 

Of course, after doing so, he realized that was a mistake. Every muscle in his body seemed to be screaming in protest, and he felt like he was going to throw up, but he could only taste blood in his mouth.

 

“Alright, that’s progress. Can you talk?” Pete struggled for a minute, his senses still muddled as slowly sound came flooding into his ears, the loud commotion of the bar behind him. He turned his head to see what was going on, but moved too fast and ended up back on the floor, this time on his side. He pushed himself back up with the help of the stranger’s hand and squinted his eyes, forcing his cloudy vision to clear, and saw the dude he had been fighting being knocked to the ground by another stranger absolutely covered in tattoos.

 

“Okay, so I’ll take that as a no?” The stranger spoke up again and Pete suddenly remembered what he had been asked.

 

“I can talk,” he slurred, his tongue in a strange amount of pain. After a second, he vaguely remembered biting it when the dude punched him in the jaw. “Just not… good.” Pete finished, bringing a hand up to his lips. When he pulled it away, he saw that the tan skin was bloody, and swore.

 

“Don’t worry, we’ll get you all fixed up, okay?” The stranger got his attention again, and Pete turned to him, confused. He looked over the person, but it didn’t seem that he was any sort of medical worker, if the lack of any medical supplies was any indication.

 

“Are you gonna…” Pete paused, confused as to why words were coming out of his mouth, but quickly remembered what he was going to say. “Are you gonna call an ambulance or something? Because I’m fine. I don’t-” He cut himself off by pitching forward and grabbing the nearest trash can, he heaved up anything that was inside of his stomach, including a lot of blood. After that, he laid back down on the floor. The last thing he remembered was thinking that the floor was a perfectly reasonable place to take a nap, and the stranger shaking his shoulders in an attempt to wake him up.

 

When he woke once more, the bar floor had gotten much more comfortable than it was previously, and it confused him to no end when he turned and felt his entire body fall off… _something_ ; he wasn’t sure what, since he was pretty sure the floor was the lowest level of the bar.

 

“Oh, you’re up!” He heard the stranger's voice, and opened one eye, deeming it somewhat necessary to figure out what had just happened. “Or, I guess down, since you’re back on the floor.”

 

Pete just groaned in response, decided that opening his eye had been a terrible idea, and throwing an arm over his face. “Sorry, that was pretty bad. Here, I have…” He felt the stranger nudge his arm away from his forehead, and then a cool washcloth was placed onto the burning skin.

 

“How are you feeling?” The stranger asked, pressing the cold washcloth to different parts of his face now that his arm was back to Pete’s side, wiping away blood that had stained his skin already.

 

“Pretty shitty, but I’ll survive. Where am I?” Pete replied, words still slurred due to his lip being two times its usual size.

 

“You’re at my house. Specifically, on the floor of my room. Andy and I thought it would be best to bring you here, instead of leaving you on the street or something. We would have brought you to your place if you wanted, but you were kinda… well, you passed out on the bar floor again before I could ask,” the stranger explained, gently placing the washcloth back onto Pete’s forehead. After a couple seconds of silence, Pete had deemed it safe to open his eyes, if he was slow, and squinted against the light coming in the window.

 

When he finally adjusted to the light, he turned to look at the stranger, and was taken aback for a moment. The man before him was short, blue eyed with blonde hair, which was mussed up from sleep. The small smile on his face was friendly, but not overly so, and his face resembled the characteristics a baby would have. Although, the dude was working it, so Pete had to give him that.

 

“I’m Patrick,” the stranger spoke, and Pete’s eyes moved to his lips, studying its shape and the gentle way they formed around the words. He was almost too absorbed in their movement to even hear what was coming from them, he was too busy thinking to himself that God had somehow created this man’s lips to be superior to literally anyone else's lips, that there had once been dark, and then He said, “Let there be this man’s lips’.”

 

After a couple more seconds of staring, Pete realized that he actually had to respond, and couldn’t continue staring at Patrick’s lips for the rest of his life.

 

“Nice to meet you, ‘Trick. I’m Pete.” The nickname slipped easily off his bruised lips, and his only excuse was that his swollen tongue made it hard to pronounce things correctly. Patrick just raised an eyebrow at the name, holding out a clean glass of water. Pete took it, and downed the whole thing in seconds, trying to head off the impending hangover, which was waiting for the rest of the pain in his body to be soothed before it took over. For that, he was grateful. He was suffering through enough without his head splitting in two as well. He looked around the rest of the room when Patrick stood back up to put the cup on a desk across the room. Only then did Pete realize that he was currently laying on the ground next to an unmade bed, one he had presumably been sleeping in. If the crack of Patrick’s back was any indication, he had sacrificed his bed in favour of sleeping on a couch, or possibly even a floor.

 

“Oh, dude, you didn’t have to give up your bed; I probably wouldn’t have even realized if you dumped me on the floor,” Pete protested, holding the now lukewarm washcloth to his forehead as he sat up. Patrick glanced back, shaking his head.

 

“I couldn’t have done that. What if you were seriously hurt? I mean, you are seriously hurt, but I mean like… broken rib or something. Which, I don’t think you have. Do your ribs hurt?” He replied, and Pete shook his head. He seemed pleased with himself for a couple seconds, before holding up one finger. “Hang on, I’ll be right back with more water and some Tylenol.”

 

Patrick was gone before Pete could protest and say that he’s fine.

 

After another inspection of the room, Pete spotted a mirror on the dresser, and pushed himself up to a standing position using the bed, ignoring the wave of nausea that hit him, and walked over to inspect his injuries. His skin wasn’t easily bruised, or at least visibly, but Pete could feel a few that would hurt like a bitch in a little while. His lip was scabbed over by now, but had obviously been bleeding profusely before. His nose piercing had fallen out sometime between being punched in the jaw and waking up on the floor of Patrick’s house, and the cartilage of his nose might have been broken, as if was slightly off center. Thankfully his lip ring hadn’t been ripped out in the fight, nor his eyebrow piercing. His beanie was missing, and his short blond hair was mussed up from sleep. Overall, not the worst injuries he’s walked away with.

 

Patrick appeared in the doorway, and Pete took the glass that was handed to him, along with the pills, downing both quickly. He handed the cup back over, noting the way Patrick was holding himself, keeping himself closed and away from Pete as much as he could. “So, I-”

 

“I should get heading back, if I don’t get a stud in this hole within the next little while, it’s going to close,” Pete interrupted him, his attitude cold. He felt bad when he saw the hurt expression on Patrick’s face, but he knew people who acted this way. They would want payback for helping him, for taking Pete into their home and allowing them to sleep in his bed. He hated those kinds of people, and felt the need to flee rising in his throat. He had fooled himself into thinking Patrick was different, even if just for the second that he had been looking up at the dude, who was outlined in the bright sunlight coming from the window, looking like an angel for a brief second before he leaned back and Pete had gotten his first look at him. Of course, he still thought Patrick had looked like an angel without the halo of light.

 

“What? I mean, okay? If that’s what you want to do. I can drive you, or something,” Patrick replied, frowning at his hands which wear currently being tangled in his knit sweater. He looked too wholesome to be at a bar, especially the one Pete had been at last night, but he faintly remembered another stranger covered in tattoos, who seemed to be with Patrick. _Boyfriend_? He thought, raising an eyebrow. If Patrick had been with a dude like that, Pete might be able to see them at the bar, but it was still unlikely.

 

“I can take the bus, don’t worry about it. I’ll see you around,” Pete stated firmly, and grabbed his leather jacket from where he had spotted it earlier, hanging off the end of the headboard. Patrick looked like he was about to say something, to stop him, but Pete was out of the room before he could choke out a response, pulling his jacket over his aching arms. He passed tattooed guy in the living room, noting that he was watching Game Of Thrones and nodding in appreciation, before exiting the small apartment.

 

After wandering around the streets for a little while, Pete was itching for a cigarette, but after patting the pockets of both his pants and his jacket, he discovered that they were missing.

 

“ _Fucking asshole jacked my smokes_ ,” He thought to himself, scowling at the sidewalk. He swore loudly when he realized his wallet was missing as well, and kicked a nearby sign. Which was possibly the worst idea he had had so far. “Motherfucker!” He yelped, jumping on one foot for a minute until his toes stopped feeling like they were going to fall off.

 

Sighing, he sat down on a wooden bench, his ass getting wet from the previous night's rain. He would have literally killed a man for a cigarette in that moment, but no interesting targets wondered by, though an old lady did glare at him from across the street. Curling his knees up to his chest and running a hand through his hair, Pete admitted to himself that he was completely and utterly lost, and probably should have asked which part of Chicago they were in before angrily storming out of Patrick’s apartment. Another couple minutes of sitting there was enough time to decide to get up, and start looking around again for familiar landmarks, and eventually he found his way back to the side of town that he lived.

 

Of course, he would have much rathered stay in Patrick’s neighborhood. Here, most people couldn’t afford air conditioning, even rent sometimes. It was dodgy and unsafe, but it was home. Pete wouldn’t get kicked out for playing his bass at 3 am, because just yesterday the people who lived above him were getting in an argument at 2 am, and ended up having loud, hate sex until 5 am. Of course, half the time his cheap amp didn’t even register that it was plugged in, and even when the volume gauge was stuck at 2.

 

He let himself into the apartment, thankful that his keys were still in the inner lining of his jacket where he always hid them when going to the bar, and immediately was hit with a wave of sour milk smell. Pete swore again, and grabbed the milk jug he had left on the counter overnight. He dumped it into the sink, almost retching from the smell, and threw the jug in the recycling container.

 

Pete sat down on a kitchen chair, which wobbled under his weight, and he was once again reminded that Travie had snapped one of the legs last week, and it was now held together with hope and duct tape. Of course, he had promised to replace it as soon as he could, but both he and Pete knew that might not be for a long time, given that they were both starving artists, and very committed to their own crafts.

 

He looked over his own, even smaller apartment, and let out a long sigh. Every part of his body was jealous of Patrick and his seemingly perfect life. Even if his apartment was tiny, it was obvious that he liked it that way, and could have afforded a larger one if he pleased. Pete, however, couldn’t even afford to feed himself half the time. He rested his head on the table, and swore again, cursing how he couldn’t manage to be an adult even after 23 years of trying, when this man he’d met obviously had done so, and more, helping others who acted like five years olds when drunk, and fixing up strays he found on the street. He groaned again, loudly, and the little old lady living next to him banged on the wall. With all the energy left in himself, he flipped off the wall, and got up, dragging himself to his mattress on the floor, where he could wallow in peace.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> WHOA I STARTED WRITING THIS AND IT JUST KEPT ON COMING AND I LIKE IT A LOT YES also I realize that fob is already kind of "punk" or whatever you crazy kids call it but I mean Super!!!! Punk!!! in the tags, where Pete gets in a lot of fights because why not??? and he loves it, even if most times he gets rly badly hurt and I honestly don't know where this is going it's 2:14 am 
> 
> Many many thanks to my wonderful editor josh, who you can find here:  
> http://transbrendon.tumblr.com/
> 
> Tell me things at my tumblr (like if I should continue this or not):  
> http://canadianpsxcho.tumblr.com/ask
> 
> I am putting myself through college rn, so if you have a spare few dollars, maybe toss me a couple bucks for a coffee! http://ko-fi.com/humanwreakage


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